If you’ve heard of business models for selling services, then you will easily understand drop servicing. Yes, this is also one of those business models designed for selling services online. Here, the only difference is, you will not provide services all by yourself. In drop servicing, you will hire freelancers who are professionals in their field. Once the work is done, you will send this directly to the client. You will then pay the freelancers and sell the service for a much higher price than the client paid you. You are essentially the middle man like eBay or Amazon.
How Much Does It Cost To Start?
The cost depends on the way you want to start the business. There are mainly two ways and one is you can start it completely free without investment. Once everything is set, you can develop or buy a dedicated website and at this stage, it becomes paid. Through website creation, you can become an independent business and you can offer all the professional touches needed for your drop servicing.
It is better to start this business initially for free if you are a beginner. But, by keeping it free, you will earn a little less. More than that, it may take some extra time to get your initial clients. If you chose the professional way, then it will cost money for the hosting, and you will need a little bit of skill using WordPress. After that, you may have to spend on driving traffic. But, the earning potential will be a lot higher. For the most part, keep the costs as low as possible, and then when you’re ready to expand, build the website.
What Services Should You Sell?
You can choose to include any type of service here. But there are many things to consider before choosing a service. First, is competition, and the other is earning potential. If you find that too many people are providing the same service then you should not pick that service. Always choose a service that has less competition and try to make sure it has a high search volume. Take a lot of time to research this as it has the potential to make or break your business.
Some of the commonly preferred drop services include:
- Lead generation
- User testing
- Animated GIFs
- Storyboards
- Social media manager
- Virtual Assistants
- Resume Writing
- Book trailers
- Voice-over
How To Start Drop Servicing
As i mentioned earlier, there are mainly two ways. One free method and other is paid. Let us understand the options you have in the free method.
The Free Method
Once you’ve found a service with a nice earning potential and little competition, its time to start to look for a freelancer.
Finding A Freelancer
There are plenty of websites meant for freelancers. Some of the most popular are; Fiverr, Upwork and PeoplePerHour. Depending on what service and budget you have its worth having a browse around the site and message people selling your service. It’s important that the freelancer understands your needs and the timeframe of your projects. This is very important as you want to keep your customers happy.
How To Find Clients
Using the free method one of the best ways to drive traffic is directly emailing clients in your area. This can be easily achieved by a quick google search and finding their website information. If you want to take this to the extra mile you can even see the client face to face or do a skype call. This will increase the client’s trust and the potential for a sale.
Placing The Orders And Delivery
Once you succeed in catching a client, it is very important to understand the service they need. After that, assign the work to a freelancer and get it done. Finally, deliver the service to the client.
The Paid Method
This method is suitable if you have some technical skills. Here you will build a website and start driving clients directly to it.
Build The Website
Here, you need to think about hosting and buying a domain. They are not costly, and you can spend 4 dollars and get this done. There are plenty of hosting services available. For example, you can choose Siteground. They offer WordPress, which is very easy to use and setup.
Once you have a website, you can rely on PayPal for payments. Now, your business is ready, and you have a professional platform for accepting orders.
Start Driving Traffic
It is better to choose AdWords for driving traffic. This is the best method you have, and it is easy to bring more and more traffic to your website. There is no point in using social platforms like Instagram and Facebook. Even though you have a lot of people using these platforms, no one searches here for services. Initially, you may have to spend at least 10 dollars per day on AdWords.
Finding The Freelancer
There is no difference between the free-way and paid way when it comes to finding the freelancer. You can easily rely on Fiverr for finding a freelancer.
Receive Order And Delivery
Once everything is set up, you will start receiving orders. Like we explained for the free way, you can contact the suitable freelancer for completing the service and assign him the job. Once the service gets completed, you can deliver it to the client.
Benefits Of Drop Servicing
You don’t need to be a genius or professional to start drop servicing. It is easy and straightforward. More than that, when we compare this drop servicing to drop shipping, it’s less risky as you can check the service before you send it to a client. There is also no need to worry about product legitimacy, refunds, and returns. You get a better overview of what’s going on, and digital products are easier to manage.
Disadvantages Of Drop Servicing
The only issue you will face here is the delivery time. You have to depend on freelancers for your job to be done, and if he doesn’t complete it on time, then you will be dealing with an unhappy client. But there is nothing to worry about since you can handle this by fixing at least two days of extra delivery time with clients. Buffering should be maintained and you have to be strict with freelancers. Always try to hire a freelancer with a good reputation and a history of on-time delivery. With all these tricks, you can easily minimize the issues.
Conclusion
Drop servicing is currently one of the best and easiest business models to get into. This is largely due to the minimal overheads and ease of setup. The earning potentials are very high if you pick the right service to sell and
@Biaheza Does a great job explaining drop servicing and also proves it works!
